Prayers and Meditations eBook

Thy glory beareth me witness! Nothing whatsoever
can withhold me from remembering Thee, though all
the tribulations of the earth were to assault me from
every direction. All the limbs and members of
my body proclaim their readiness to be torn asunder
in Thy path and for the sake of Thy pleasure, and
they yearn to be scattered in the dust before Thee.
O would that they who serve Thee could taste what
I have tasted of the sweetness of Thy love!

I implore Thee to supply whosoever hath sought Thee
with the living waters of Thy bounty, that they may
rid him of all attachment to any one but Thee.
Thou art, verily, the Omniscient, the All-Glorious,
the Almighty.

XCI: “Lauded be Thy name, O Lord my God! How great...”

Lauded be Thy name, O Lord my God! How great
is Thy might and Thy sovereignty; how vast Thy strength
and Thy dominion! Thou hast called into being
Him Who speaketh in Thy name before all who are in
Thy heaven and on Thy earth, and hast bidden Him cry
out amongst Thy creatures.

No sooner had a word gone forth from His lips, however,
than the divines among Thy people turned back from
Him, and the learned among Thy servants caviled at
His signs. Thereby the fire of oppression was
kindled in Thy land, until the kings themselves rose
up to put out Thy light, O Thou Who art the King of
kings!

Hostility waxed so intense that my kindred and my
loved ones were made captives in Thy land, and they
that are dear to Thee were hindered from gazing on
Thy beauty and from turning in the direction of Thy
mercy. This hostility failed to cause the fire
that burned within them to subside. The enemy
finally carried away as captive Him Who is the Manifestation
of Thy beauty and the Revealer of Thy signs, and confined
Him in the fortress-town of Akka, and sought to hinder
Him from remembering Thee and from magnifying Thy
name. Thy servant, however, could not be restrained
from carrying out what Thou hadst bidden Him fulfill.
Above the horizon of tribulation He hath lifted up
His voice and He crieth out, summoning all the inmates
of heaven and all the inhabitants of the earth to the
immensity of Thy mercy and the court of Thy grace.
Day and night He sendeth down the signs of Thine omnipotent
power and revealeth the clear tokens of Thy majesty,
so that the souls of Thy creatures may be drawn towards
Thee, that they may forsake themselves and turn unto
Thee, and may flee from their misery and seek the
tabernacle of Thy riches, and may haste away from
their wretchedness into the court of Thy majesty and
glory.

This is the Lamp which the light of Thine own Essence
hath lit, and whose radiance the winds of discord
can never extinguish. This is the Ocean that
moveth by the power of Thy sovereign might, and whose
waves the influence of the infidels that have disbelieved
in the Judgment Day can never still. This is
the Sun that shineth in the heaven of Thy will and
the splendor of which the veils of the workers of
iniquity and the doubts of the evil doers can never
cloud.